Warning: photos disappear if you rename/delete folders from within Files

Pixel, Android 12

I had photos downloaded that were showing up in Photos. I wanted to rename one of the folders they were in but it said name already taken, as there was an empty folder of the same name that I created in the past that no longer appeared in Photos. So I opened the Files app, went to Internal Storage / Pictures and deleted the empty folder there, then again from within Files renamed the folder I was trying to rename before. I reopen Photos, bam, my custom folders are gone, even one I did not touch from within Files. I check Files and see the folders are still there but they're now empty; the photos are gone. Not in Trash. Luckily I had the photos backed up somewhere else so I grabbed the filename of one of the photos that went missing, did a search in Total Commander, and confirmed it was nowhere to be found on my device or Cloud. Disappeared into thin air. So based on this, I would not advise renaming or deleting photo folders from within Files.

TLDR: thread title

 

I didn't try that yet because I had the photos on hand at another source and I figured if they weren't showing up in the Files app or Total Commander then they wouldn't show up on a PC either. Also since the photos disappeared I took the opportunity to delete all custom photo folders and recreate custom folders as needed from scratch from within Photos, so if I deleted the original folders that contained the photos that disappeared I'm not sure where the photos would be found. I guess if anything a data recovery app would be needed, but I already have the photos. I can take a note to do a search of my device next time I connect it but I doubt I'll find the copies of the photos that went missing.

 

It was a name of a folder that I had created but could no longer use as (apparently due to another bug) it was no longer appearing in the list of available folders to move photos to although still present in the Pictures folder in Files. So it was reasonable to try to first rename or delete the existing empty folder with the name I wanted to use via Files. What wasn't reasonable was Android removing photos in another folder from plain sight without warning simply because I renamed or deleted the first folder.

 

Yep they were no longer there.

 

Not sure what you're referring to but I looked in the Trash too and they weren't there.

 

No they weren't in Archive.

 

I had downloaded them from a source where I was able to re-download them after they had disappeared. Otherwise, as per the issue, they'd be lost.

 

Like I said, I was able to retrieve the originals from the source. But it was only a workaround to the issue (which I've reported to Google).